


Mythos

by LandBeyondtheForest



Category: Trigun
Genre: F/M, Gore, M/M, Original Character(s)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-14
Updated: 2014-01-14
Packaged: 2018-01-08 17:20:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1135365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LandBeyondtheForest/pseuds/LandBeyondtheForest
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Honor compels me to serve your brother. I told you: I owe Knives a debt. You can wear your disgust openly, because I know when I'm done, you'll still offer me a 'blank ticket.'" Explicit content. Multiple pairings. So far KxL and KxM. May take requests for pairings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Mythos

**Author's Note:**

> A/N 2014: I've decided to resurrect this fic after five years. This is a mixture of anime and manga based, but if you haven't read the manga, you probably won't understand it. If you'd like to request a pairing, just let me know and I'll try to work it in somehow or maybe write a separate one-shot.
> 
> The story is non-linear and interspersed with introspective pieces on various characters.

Mythos

One

* * *

 

Adonis- In Greek mythology, a youth of remarkable beauty, the favorite of Aphrodite. As a child he was put in the care of Persephone, who refused to allow him to return from the underworld. Mythically, Adonis represents the cycle of death and resurrection in winter and spring. []

Adonis- A handsome Greek male in mythology.

That guy just got 4 girls, he is such an Adonis. [Urban dictionary]

* * *

 

Sunset in the largest cathedral on Gunsmoke saw a supernaturally still figure waiting beneath a stained-glass rapture. Plumes of perfumed smoke, like frankincense, quietly rose to the lofty ceiling. Only when she noticed the appearance of an ochre-eyed man did the figure show signs of life.

"Legato, sweetheart," she said sardonically, addressing the newcomer. Without turning around, she lifted an alabaster hand to gesture toward the glass. "It's frightening, isn't it? What madman would build a Gothic revival on this planet, anyway?" Her strong, melodic voice echoed across the enclosure.

"One of your friends," smoothly plied Legato. His sensuous voice masked his constantly suffocated anger. "But if you're afraid, I can check under your bed for angels and gods and other myths."

She laughed: he may have been serious, but his voiced disapprovals were the closest he came to jokes.

"But I'm fond of myths, Legato." Her tone became strangely aloof. "I am one, after all."

"I can appreciate that. However," Legato added disinterestedly, "You're expected to submit to those who surpass myth."

Silence crept back into the space. The woman forwent replying, electing instead to study the window scene before her. The fantastic arabesques and variegated hues of the stained-glass delighted her immensely, but the faces of mortals in rapture served to fill her with an uneasiness that counteracted her pleasure. It seemed, she thought, that given a less wondrous backdrop, the faces would only evoke intense, frantic fear. It was the same disharmony she sensed within the man soliciting her now.

"Devout, are we? You know…I wouldn't switch places with either of them," the woman finally replied, glancing back at last and revealing her sharp canines with a reserved smirk.

"Why?"

"They are neither of them happy." Here she paused as if to invite a rebuttal, but continued once it became obvious that Legato would remain silent. It caused her some upset. "They are isolated, existing apart even from each other. All the wondrous tenets of a vampire's study…music, rhetoric, the art of sex…they care nothing for." She sent a slightly indecent gaze toward Legato. "Or they have no fellow to…learn from. Plant 'culture' is nonexistent. Who among the damned would condemn herself to a life ignoring beauty?"

Legato maintained his deathly stillness as his tone grew more sweetly venomous. "You reach too far." Whenever he deigned to speak, the woman thought, the room around him seemed to shrink away. "They embody beauty perfectly, don't you agree?"

Juno raised her eyes to the vaulting ceiling and grinned.

"No, no, no, no….," murmured Juno, her voice trailing off as she approached the altar, then whirled around to fix Legato with her frivolous stare. Minutes seemed to pass as she simply stood, frozen, in harmony with the other relics of earthly life in the church. Any normal mortal would have felt strangely out of place, as if some sculpted work of piety had upset nature and decided to contemplate him. When she was satisfied with her survey of Legato, Juno drew a short breath and, rejoining reality, pursued her argument.

"You will see I'm right, Legato. As for the younger one…don't let's pretend you find him beautiful at all. You hate him and you know it, and we need say no more."

Even as she spoke of Vash, Juno felt a prickling insistence somewhere in her mind, which she identified as anger communicated from a disapproving Knives. The intensity, she decided, meant he had to be just around the corner.

"As for your Knives," she continued undaunted, "he is like the beautiful youth Adonis. A complicated figure whom the majority honors more for his godly beauty than his higher offices. Don't act like the masses, Legato…it doesn't become you." She inclined her head toward the psychic.

"If one were to stand outside the immediate radiance of Adonis," Juno continued, stepping back to take in Legato, "he would see that the youth's beauty is not so significant. Besides…isn't it easier for humans to fawn over someone they feel forbidden to admire?" She made a strange face and turned away once more, thoroughly breaking the mysterious spell of their former conversation.

But Legato rejected her levity. "You speak as if you forget that you are human. Don't worry." Legato deepened his potent gaze, finally shedding some of the eeriness of immobility. "As I've been entrusted with teaching Vash the Stampede his divinity, so I've been charged with helping you remember your lowliness."

Juno faced him fully now, her tone growing serious once more.

"You're sick, Legato." The words sounded less accusative than concerned. "You shouldn't wish to kill your own kind."

"Oh really," Legato chuckled. "Are we going there again?"

Juno now approached him, and Legato seemed genuinely amused by her persistence.

"Oh yes…but you misunderstand me. Regardless of whether Homo sapiens deserves extinction, it's pathologic for a member of said species to welcome and advance extinction! It's not in your best interests. And stop giving me that look!"

Legato indulged her by mastering his sardonic grin. "How do you suppose?"

"Legato…you're a member of a social race. You're not independent. No one can be." She considered her words a while, how they had gotten away from her, and resumed her detached demeanor before adding, "but then…you don't want to live, right? Silly me, I suppose you can disregard all I've said on that."

"Caught on, have you? I thought I might be guilty of subtlety."

Here Juno couldn't suppress a hearty laugh.

But Legato's bearing suddenly shifted back to reserve. "I'm going now. I dislike talking with you. Master," he added, with a bow, to Knives, who had chosen that moment to appear.

Juno missed nothing. "Oh how unfortunate you dislike talking with me, then, because I rather like looking at you, and it's easier to do when I've got your attention." She ignored the approaching plant, her eyes trained instead on Legato's prostrate form.

"Only with your permission, Master," drawled Legato in what he hoped was his least offensive voice. Some mental exchange had obviously been made, for the humbled youth slipped away almost immediately.

Annoyed, Juno addressed herself. "'I'm going, I don't like talking with you,'" she mocked Legato. "Talking 'with' me…he hardly says a word."

"It's infuriating," she added, shamelessly looking Knives up and down.

* * *

 

Juno The Roman mother and moon goddess. Also known as Optima Maxima: the greatest woman.

Reviews are welcome if you're so inclined.

Disclaimer: Don't own Trigun. Not for profit. Just for shits and giggles.


	2. Legato

Mythos

Two

Legato  


[KxL]  


* * *

  


le·ga·to

adverb or adjective \li-ˈgä-(ˌ)tō\

music : in a manner that is smooth and flowing

Italian, literally, tied

* * *

  


"What is your name?" He had asked.

"I...have none!" I had replied.

It had begun very poorly, but for a long while, that was the happiest day of my life.

I remember the first time I saw Him. The late afternoon desert sun wreathing His head in golden light. He stood there before me, as perfect as a statue, a body hewn from marble, His eyes cutting into my slight form. He was an angel of vengeance sadly out of place on this forsaken planet. I can truly say that I had never understood the meaning of perfection before that moment. He all at once gave me my freedom and a purpose and in time, a name. Legato. I have always treasured my name for it fell from His lips into me.

Sometimes in quiet moments I wonder why He spared me that day. He often must remind me that I live only so long as I am useful. But what conceivable use could He have figured for me then? Did He in His infinite wisdom see in the eyes of a child the will to carry out His own will?

Life at His side then was a fancy taken from a dream. A haze of death followed Him and began to follow me. How many would I kill just for His smile? How many would I selfishly slaughter just for a moment of His notice? I gladly placed humanity on the altar of my devotion.

At July I nearly lost my mind. Conrad and I were headed east five miles outside of July when we saw it. A blinding flash of white light to our backs. A loud, echoing boom and a wave of heat that swept over the back of my neck. When I turned around the light obliterated my senses and all thought. When my vision returned a moment later I realized I was on my back and when my thoughts came crashing back down the first thing that flitted through my mind was Him. By the time we made it to the ruins of the city, worry had had time to birth all kinds of horrible scenarios in my mind but even so I was wholly unprepared for reality. A vast expanse of flat land spread out before me where July had been. I looked up at the sky like a bowl over the empty space. I looked down and He, or one half of Him, lay upon the ground. From what seemed like a great distance I heard Conrad call for my help and in my panic I fell heavily to my knees and gathered up His viscera desperately. It slid over my pale hands, His blood staining my skin, the scent of it seeping into my lungs permanently and all the while screams tearing from my throat. And then He turned to me and addressed me. Life was seeping from Him and He still addressed me. At that moment despite everything a feeling of warmth settled in my chest.

Later when I understood that it was His own brother who had done this to Him, a feeling of rage such as I have never known suffused my being and I have made sure it will never leave, stoking it with secret thoughts and dark desires. My Master's brother can never repent for that sin. I long for him to suffer for the wrongness of his actions. Mine is the anger of the righteous. Perhaps that is why…

At Jeneora Rock I committed the greatest sin. It was not wanting to kill His own brother, who has caused my Master such pain. I hear it in His voice. I see it in His face. No, my sin is, I am ashamed to admit, that in my vanity I imagined myself to be enough for Him. But I learned that day, as He punished my pride, as bone cracked and blood spilled, that even the sacrifice of my whole existence is forever insufficient.

The first time He sullied Himself with my flesh I wept bitterly alone all night. What pains of the flesh He had left me with were a bounty, the insufferable feeling was in knowing that I had tempted Him. Like a filthy spider, how long had I been spinning my web? What was worse, I enjoyed the experience and longed for it again. I relished the closeness to Him. I have always known that other humans desire me, that I am attractive. I had that knowledge burned into my very skin as a child. But never did I in my blasphemy consider myself a treasure until He touched me.

It was a pleasure so intense as to push the edge of pain. Searing pleasure. So intense that I swear I felt damnation at my back. To feel His weight on top of me, His strong hands around my neck quickened my blood in a way nothing else can, not even killing in service to Him. It was nothing like the touch of man I had endured so many times before in the past. And when He had done with me and we parted I felt a dearth in my bones. I understood from that day the purpose of fleshly being and if He calls me to worship, I will. On my back, on my knees in service to this incomparable entity.

I know that others call me a slave, but I am truly free, for I have seen the truth made flesh.

* * *

  


July.

Knives watched as Dr. William Conrad removed the patches and wires from Vash's arm. This was the precipice of the future. The beginning of the end. If Vash's "gate" was actually greater than his own…Knives didn't feel challenged. Instead a warm sense of brotherly pride filled his chest.

Conrad turned to him slowly.

"Knives, I don't like this. You two haven't spoken for nearly a century. Perhaps it would be best to take things slow and—"

"What business is it of yours?" Knives cut in. "You've served your purpose for now. I don't need you here anymore."

Conrad allowed silence to fill the room for a moment while he chose his next words carefully.

"I understand that," he began. "All I mean to say is that it is highly likely that Vash will be disoriented when he wakens and unreceptive to any tutelage about his…gift."

Knives stood up and walked to Vash's side.

"Take Legato. There is a satellite city not too far east of here. Wait for my word from there," he addressed Conrad in a tone that brooked no argument, eyes still trained on his twin.

Conrad sagged and walked to the door before turning around again.

"Knives—"

"I told you to go," Knives said in a low, deadly voice.

After Conrad retreated upstairs, Knives spent several minutes studying Vash's prone form. His eyes traced the many scars. They told a story of pain and shame. He could barely imagine each instance that had led to a new mark upon his brother's skin. Each beating, each laceration, each blasphemy against his brother. This was the price to live among them. It was the most incontrovertible proof that humanity was a scourge. Could Vash still deny his logic? No. Knives would talk and Vash would listen and everything would be as it was before. Before Knives had shouldered the burden of exterminating the human race alone. He remembered being in the control room of the SEEDS ship and engineering the Big Fall. He had never taken a life before and in his nervousness he had begun to chew on his thumb, willing himself to do what he had to do. He knew then that Vash didn't have the will to do what was necessary. He didn't notice the absent-minded gnawing until he had chewed clean through to the bone, and a sharp pain and a throbbing warmth shot through his arm. He had stared at the offending digit with a look of horror as the warmth traveled up his arm and coalesced in the tip of his thumb and bloomed into the form of a great long knife.

That had been his introduction to the angel arm. But Vash's would be different. He would make sure that Vash's experience would be nothing but the sublime sensation of the flow of energy from his being into the world and once Vash understood the power he possessed, an inhuman power, his true nature as a plant, then Vash would be forced to kneel to Knives's vision.

"We will cleanse this place of humanity together...one way or another," Knives whispered.

Soon after, he climbed the stairs to the surface of the old house. The murmuring of a solitary voice from the floor above caught his attention.

"…crouched within that centuried coffin, embraced by a close-packed nightmare retinue of huge, sinewy, sleeping bats, was the bony thing my friend and I had robbed; not clean and placid as we had seen it then, but covered with caked blood and shreds of alien flesh and hair,…"

Juno's voice drifted softly to his ears. From the cadence of her voice it seemed she was reading aloud. When he pushed the door open he beheld Juno doing of all things reading to a soundly sleeping Legato.

Knives sauntered through the doorway as he kept his eyes fixed on the pair. Legato had long since lapsed into slumber, lying in gentle repose with his head in Juno's lap. She didn't pat his head reassuringly or show any other affection; she knew that it would only upset this boy who had often been the object of unwanted touches. And watching them Knives was reminded that despite his "technique," Legato was still very much a boy.

"…and leering sentiently at me with phosphorescent sockets and sharp ensanguined fangs yawning twistedly in mockery of my inevitable doom. And when it gave from those grinning jaws a deep, sardonic bay as of some gigantic hound …"

Knives stood in front of the pair stoically, but oddly in a way unique to him that demanded full attention, and Juno finally closed the book and looked up. He immediately captured her gaze and it seemed to her that he was in an unusually good mood. At least the usually poised plant's fingers twitched in seeming anticipation.

"Conrad's testing is complete. Vash is still unconscious but he will wake soon and I will be there," he said simply.

"I suppose you two have a great deal to discuss," replied Juno.

An uncomfortable silence passed between them.

"What are you going to do with him?" Juno said finally.

Knives sighed and stepped forward slowly into the room and leaned slightly against the mantle, eyes darkening in deep thought.

"That will depend entirely on him."

Their voices stirred Legato, who, realizing his proximity to Juno, sat up immediately. The boy stretched like a lazy cat and then proceeded to alternate between averting his eyes from Knives and sneaking glances of him, as he always did in Knives's presence. Juno wondered if Legato hoped Knives would notice his glances and punish him. If so he must have been disappointed because Knives ignored him and continued to stare at an unidentified spot on the floor.

"Why is the whelp still here?" asked Knives suddenly. Legato's eyes brightened a bit.

"Oh," replied Juno, "Wilhelm went out to procure a pair of toma. They'll be leaving shortly. And I'm headed north I suppose." One corner of her mouth turned up in a small smirk before she added, "Unless you'd like me to knock out your brother again and drag him somewhere else."

Knives regarded her icily and said, "You will go north to the Eye of Michael where you will submit to testing." Juno shifted in her seat but said nothing.

"You're learning to do as you're told," added Knives in a satisfied tone.

Knives quietly retreated to the basement again and Conrad swung open the front door. He looked at Legato.

"Alright. Let's go."

Legato swept past Conrad out the open door and the older man said goodbye to Juno and turned to leave.

"Wilhelm," Juno called after him in a low voice.

Conrad turned around with raised eyebrows. Juno fixed him with a hard stare and a frown.

"Is your curiosity satisfied yet?" she asked disapprovingly.

"Is yours?" he quipped before walking outside, closing the door behind him.

* * *

  


A/N: The story that Juno reads to Legato is H.P. Lovecraft's "The Hound." Not mine.


	3. In a Glass, Darkly

Mythos

Three

In a Glass, Darkly

[KxM]

* * *

 

When Vash returned with his brother, she'd had eyes only for Vash. She had been so afraid that she would never see his sunny face again, she didn't even ask about the man slung over his shoulder, the wedge that would come between her and the man who had dropped into her heart.

Vash's first order of business was to get Knives out of town, so almost as soon as he made it back he was looking for a place on the outskirts to stay, and in his hurry he barely protested when the girls insisted that they move in with him to keep tabs on the infamous gunman. Vash didn't admit that the real reason he allowed it was a selfish one; the girls gave him courage.

Knives was unconscious for a solid week and in that time Meryl had plenty of opportunities to make several false starts in confessing her feelings to Vash. Whenever she found herself alone with him, the air would go stale, a feeling like a hand constricting her throat would settle in and she'd have to beat a hasty retreat out of the room. And by the time Knives was awake, Vash spent most of his time arguing with his rapidly healing brother behind closed doors.

Just once the night before, she had caught him alone on the front porch. The dry desert air threatened to steal her ambition. The setting suns blazed a crimson trail across the porch, lighting the man with a rosy glow. Steeling her nerves, she had called his name softly but when he turned around his eyes showed an uncharacteristic seriousness that took the wind from her sails. The coming coldness of the desert night chased her back into the house.

Perhaps it was because of her preoccupation with the dopey blonde that she never noticed Knives creeping closer like a snake.

It had begun innocently enough. A stolen glance at her over the upturned edge of his coffee cup. Surprising her by entering a room when her back was turned and stealthily slipping past her. He never brushed her. She only felt the air rustling in his wake, carrying his particular scent. He even deigned to talk to her every now and again. Although only when he needed something and he never addressed her by name. She was always "you" or "human." Or sometimes "bitch." Lately she felt unusually vulnerable near him. He seemed to know her discomfort and he often allowed his eyes to linger on her longer than was perhaps decent.

She was always flustered despite herself. He was so like Vash and yet they were polar opposites. Knives was Vash gazing through the Looking Glass. And his eyes. Where Vash's eyes filled her with a feeling of warmth and safety, Knives's gaze could plunge her into a world of fear or anger by turns. Still she had to admit that he was gorgeous. When he had been unconscious and she had to doctor his wounds, she had often marveled at this mass murderer who looked like a sleeping child. Like a wolf in sheep's clothing, he reminded her of the tales she had heard in church as a child. About how the devil was very beautiful.

Of course, Meryl didn't believe in most of that crap. She had seen the devil in too many ordinary people.

Still, she probably should have seen it coming. But she had no real chance.

His reasons were simple. He knew that she really belonged to his brother, so he wanted to possess her. He hated to admit that he was also just curious. What was it about her that made his brother so soft? Whether Vash actually returned her feelings not even Knives could intuit, but he knew that Vash would do anything in his power to protect his human friends, even at the expense of his own safety. Why?

* * *

 

Meryl climbed the dusty stairs in silence, laundry basket on one hip. She made the rounds collecting everyone's dirty clothes. By the time she had made it to Vash's things she was almost angrily stuffing the articles into her basket-after brushing off the stray donut crumbs-as she berated herself for the millionth time for allowing herself to become so upset over Vash. At first she was upset over her not being able to tell him her feelings and now she was just upset for being upset. Lost in thought, she knocked a little louder and harder on Knives's door than was necessary.

When a characteristically silent Knives opened the door she marched in without even glancing at him, so great was her ire, and quickly gathered up his laundry. She didn't realize until she stood up that Knives had moved to block her exit in front of the open door. He stood shirtless in a pair of denim jeans slung low over his hips, barely revealing his sharp hipbones. She drank him in surreptitiously. The slope of his broad shoulders. The muscled expanse of his chest and the thin blonde trail of hair leading to his groin. He was so like Vash, except for the conspicuous absence of any scars, beside the suggestion of a mark where Vash had shot him months before.

"Excuse me," she mumbled, walking toward the door. When Knives didn't move, she looked up at him and promptly froze.

Something in his eyes, like a warning, made her feel like a cornered mouse. His usually cold eyes were alive with some sort of heat, something stirring just below the surface. She was about to back away when he grabbed her slight shoulders and pushed her further into the room.

She tried to run past him, hopelessly trying to make it through the doorway, but he simply slipped his hands about her waist, twirled her around and flung her heavily on the bed. When she began to rise he was already on her, hands on either side of her head caging her in. At first she flailed, hands flying up instinctually toward his eyes but he merely frowned and knocked her hands away, pinning her tiny wrists to the bed. His much larger form loomed over her as he studied her, listening to her ragged breathing beneath him. The already diminutive girl shrank from him, trying to sink into the bed and escape his iron grip and furiously cutting gaze. Then without warning he let her go and backed away. In disbelief she slowly sat up, not daring to take her eyes off of him.

"Alright," he said, standing clear of the door. "Go, if you really want to."

She inclined her head to him, mouth slightly agape. He could always take her by force. But he wanted it to be her decision. He wanted her to turn the events of this night over and over in her mind when she was alone with him.

"The choice is yours, Meryl," he said slowly and with secret cunning, finally calling her by her given name.

For once, Meryl Stryfe was rendered speechless. She stood nervously and raised a hand to her heart. Her eyes searched the room, unseeing. Her hand fluttered on her breast. She didn't like the glint of confidence in Knives's eyes. But at the same time, she wasn't walking away. She didn't know what to do. Just yesterday she was failing miserably in her attempt to tell Vash her feelings and now all of a sudden she was being propositioned by his unstable brother. Knives merely watched the outward display of her inner struggle with a small smile creeping across his lips. Tears began to cloud her vision and when she looked forward, she could almost imagine that it was Vash that stood before her. Then she resolutely wiped the tears from her eyes and Knives once again entered her vision. She looked into his expectant eyes.

"I…as long as the others don't hear."

Knives's devilish grin widened and he reached behind him to close the door.

Knives advanced on her and before she knew what was happening she felt his hand running up her leg, pushing up her skirt and hooking around to cup her ass while his other hand found the small of her back and pulled her forward to him. Then all of a sudden he seized either lapel of her collar and ripped her blouse open, buttons showering the floor. She started to reprimand him angrily, but he quickly silenced her with a finger across her lips. She shrugged off her blouse while Knives dropped her skirt to the floor. He laid a palm between her breasts to push her back onto the bed and then proceeded to slide her black tights off her lithe legs. She reached behind her to unclasp her bra, revealing her pert breasts to him.

Then she lay beneath him and she felt his warm hands insistently pressing against the sensitive flesh of her inner thighs. Her thighs parted for him and he settled between them, resting on his forearms before reaching down with one hand. She gasped as he slid his thick middle finger into her, positioning the thumb of the same hand on her clit and she cooed slightly as he dragged the finger inside her toward her opening and back over and over again. As Meryl's arousal wakened she grew bold and drew her hands up to run down the swell of his chest to the muscles of his abdomen, contracting ever so slightly with his breath. She quickly slickened under his touch, lying back with her eyes closed in a haze of pleasure. The klink of his belt coming undone disturbed her reverie.

She held her breath and then he pushed his hips persistently forward, insinuating himself into her and she felt him stretching her completely, leaving no part of her untouched. It hurt. But she didn't mind; she wanted to remember her choice in the morning. They shared a deep, moaning sigh when he picked up a steady rhythm.

"Knives…," she moaned softly.

"Don't say my name, human," breathed Knives in a voice thick with lust and she felt the rumble of his words in his chest. "It's too much above you to pass your lips."

"Fine…asshole," Meryl retorted.

In response, Knives sped his thrusts to an inhuman speed and Meryl's mouth opened in a silent scream of pleasure.


End file.
